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Dawsonville Highway-McEver Road congestion among transportation issues to get studied in 2018

Traffic congestion has been an issue at the intersection of Dawsonville Highway and McEver Road in Gainesville. -photo by David Barnes
- photo by David Carnes

Jeff Gill / Gainesville Times

Updated:
Oct. 4, 2017, 4:47 p.m.

Hall County can proceed with four transportation studies —
including one examining Dawsonville Highway-McEver Road traffic flow — now that
it has been approved for $520,000 in federal road planning money.

The studies involve a potential road connector system involving
Dawsonville Highway and McEver Road, pedestrian/bicycling trail connections in
Gainesville and South Hall, and Oakwood traffic improvements.

Several steps lie ahead before the efforts begin, with the Hall
County Board of Commissioners’ approval of consultants set for Dec. 14, said
Sam Baker, transportation planning manager with the Gainesville-Hall
Metropolitan Planning Organization.

The MPO is the Hall area’s lead transportation planning agency.

The plan is to finish the studies by June 30, he added.

Contracts with the Georgia Department of Transportation “give us
until the end of 2018 to complete the studies,” Baker said.

However, “we want to complete them sooner so that the local
governments have some study results to share with the public if they choose to
pursue a transportation special purpose local option sales tax next fall.”

The Dawsonville Highway/McEver Road study could have the largest
impact, as that area is experiencing ever-increasing traffic congestion.

The study will focus on traffic flow through the heavily
commercialized intersection but also potential connections between Dawsonville
Highway and McEver.

The area’s traffic congestion has been the subject of much
public interest this year, especially with the Gainesville City Council’s
consideration — and eventual approval — of an 860-home older-adult community
off Dawsonville Highway and Ahaluna Drive.

Several steps are being taken to address traffic, including DOT
plans to change the intersection on McEver at entrances to Village Shoppes at
Gainesville and McEver Corners shopping centers.

In a project that could wrap up by Black Friday, motorists will
no longer be able to turn left out of Village Shoppes to head south on McEver
or turn left into the shopping center heading south from Dawsonville Highway.

Also, through a series of concrete median fixes, McEver Corners
shoppers won’t be able to turn left to head north on Dawsonville Highway.

Gainesville plans to use live video to keep an eye on
intersections along the Ga. 53 corridor in the McEver Road area and make
immediate signal timing changes as needed, public works director Chris Rotalsky
has said.

The two trail studies focus on efforts by several governments to
expand existing systems running from Gainesville to Friendship Road/Ga. 347 in
South Hall.

On the northern end, Gainesville wants to connect its Midtown
Greenway to Hall County’s Highlands to Islands Trail.

The Midtown Greenway ends at Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard
east of Queen City Parkway/Ga. 60. And Highlands to Islands Trail’s Chicopee
Section ends at Palmour Drive west of the parkway.

And there’s a lot of developed property in between, including
Lee Gilmer Memorial Airport.

Among other things, a study could show how the trail might
intertwine with intersections between the two trails, such as Palmour Drive at
Aviation Boulevard and Georgia Avenue at Industrial Boulevard.

In South Hall, the potential multi-use trail could run between
Mundy Mill Road in Oakwood to Friendship Road near Flowery Branch and Buford.

The concept started about five years ago as officials learned
that the widening of Ga. 347 would include a multi-use path and then later that
the Spout Springs Road widening also would have such an amenity, City Manager
Flowery Branch Bill Andrew has said.

The trail also would connect with Highlands to Islands.

“While Hall County, Flowery Branch and Oakwood are directly
involved with this effort, we will have the ability to work with Gainesville
and tie together several efforts into one common goal,” Andrew said in an email
this week.

The Oakwood roads study will look particularly at potential
intersection fixes, ranging from turning radius fixes to a roundabout at the
post office on Main Street.

“There’s a number of different locations we think are worth us
getting a study done to where we can get some conceptual-level layouts and some
cost estimates,” City Manager Stan Brown has said.

All the studies have varying costs, with each one requiring a 20
percent funding match from the respective governments.